MO-SEN 2022 megathread: ERIC

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

Still safe R

Not in a Republican midterm or if he is successfully primaried by a Roy Moore/Eric Greitens-tier candidate.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

Still safe R

Not in a Republican midterm or if he is successfully primaried by a Roy Moore/Eric Greitens-tier candidate.

Greitens wants to primary Hawley I think.

He'd need to secure other office to rebuild his power base first or bank on Hawley being trapped in a drawn-out presidential primary and becoming too unpopular to easily switch back to a 2024 Senate bid. The latter is a really long shot and I'd guess Hawley would have one of the easiest Republican primaries in MO, ceteris paribus.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

If Blunt retires in a Biden midterm, it's Likely R.

Sarah Steelman's seat if she wants it.

The race probably gets marginally easier for Republicans if Blunt retires in a Biden midterm and the nominee isn't Greitens. Blunt is a weak incumbent.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

Does anyone think this might actually give the GOP a scare with Kander in 2022? Not saying he has a path just yet, but it might require the Republicans to send more money to Missouri than they'd like when they should be focusing on New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and other such states.

In the event that Blunt doesn't get primaried and it's a Biden midterm, Democrats would be much better off conserving Kander's political capital for a more winnable race. He'd have an easier path to a row office victory that year.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

Party like it’s January 2009, but with Biden as P rather than VP. Sometimes you need absurd luck in politics, and Blunt has had a lot of it in his career. (I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t retire, though.)

Given the gradual ageing of the median Senator, why would you expect his retirement to be odds on? He'd only be 72 and it's the third term in which most Senators amass enough formal/informal seniority to gain firm political influence. He's only done two so far.

While I think he'd be vulnerable to a primary challenge, that luck you mentioned already seems to have delivered him a few gifts on that front. Hawley is already in the Senate, Greitens is probably too controversial to beat him in a primary (although he wouldn't be lock by any means) and much of the hype surrounding Ashcroft has really died down. Parson would probably prefer to stay governor than fight a Senate challenge just to cut his last term short.

I'm sure one could emerge, but there aren't any screamingly obvious rising stars in the MOGOP who are publicly positioning themselves for a tilt at Blunt's seat.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

https://www.twitter.com/BryanLowry3/status/1328331495380054018

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

Democrats aren’t going to win Missouri through demographic change alone. They’re going to have to find a way to appeal to rural voters.

They can't. Rural voters have gone full fascist, and will not vote for Democrats no matter what. That's why this race is Safe R whether Blunt retires or not.

Pretty sure calling rural voters fascists just because they don’t vote for socialism and the “woke” culture war isn’t the way to win them or the senate back....

That’s not what candidates have been doing. They can be changed at the margins, but individual candidates and campaigns have largely proven unable to reverse rural-suburban trends. The national parties didn’t change it this cycle, either.

I’m not saying they shouldn’t try, but it may well be infeasible without policy changes that aren’t going to happen. In that case, Missouri is gone for Democrats regardless of how many moderate heroes they run there. It’s certainly safe R in a 2022 federal race (I assume Greitens isn’t going to manage an upset).

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

https://twitter.com/politicoalex/status/1394425490275016709

Let this be the end of Eric Greitens!

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

I have no idea what the national party sees in Nixon. 

The past. For MO Democrats, that's understandable, if misguided.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

Everyone here is dunking on Nixon, but name one candidate that would do better (Besides Kander who doesn't want it anymore)

Russ Carnahan, Chris Koster, etc. They're not especially good candidates, but they were reasonably well-liked Democrats in their time and not nearly as stained by controversy as Jay Nixon was by the end of his tenure.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

We shouldn't even be having this megathread. Megathreads are for competitive races.

The Republican primary is competitive and likely to be one of the highest-profile Senate primaries in 2022.